Appropriation of “Natural” Resources and Criminalisation of Peasant Communities: the Rufiji Case (Tanzania)

In Tanzania, the Rufiji floodplain is populated by people earning most of their living from agriculture and fisheries. Revenues from legal fishing hardly suffice for food security of households, and do not really allow for other investments or expenses. In order to earn enough money, for instance, to pay for secondary school fees, many villagers actually need to leave the legal fishing zones and, risking life and limb, penetrate the Selous Reserve, where several lakes abounding in fish are situated. The reserve, in close proximity to the villages, has been gradually established during the 20th century through a series of authoritarian and coercive measures. Local villagers do not benefit from the considerable revenues it generates. New “participatory” approaches and conservation policies, implemented over the past few decades, have so far only been declarations of intent without tangible impact on livelihoods.